We watch a film.

I received ‘Once Upon a Time in the West’ for Christmas. A ‘Spaghetti Western’ (they were called that because they were filmed in Spain), it stars lots of men in hats, and is famous for its indifferent violence and the lead character being introduced by a short but simple musical theme whenever he strolls into shot. Thus it influenced countless subsequent works, including ‘Bod’.

It is sometimes difficult to select films to watch. The LTLP likes any film that should feature Harrison Ford (nb he doesn’t have to actually be in it, it just needs to be the sort of film that he might have been sent by his agent). I, on the other hand, refuse to watch anything that involves a chap who has a bit of a rocky relationship with his ex-wife and young son but who nevertheless has rescued them from great peril by the final reel.

Anyway, I was particularly looking forward to seeing this film again. I inform her that the opening sequence is one of the greatest in all cinema, ever.

“Is anybody going to say anything?” she asks, after about five minutes.

“They are looking at each other meaningfully,” I explain, knowledgeably.

“Why did they just shoot him?” she asks.

I explain that I could tell her why they just shot him, but that it would be likely to be something explained further on in the film as the story developed.

We continue watching.

“Is he the bad guy, then?”

“Essentially, yes.”

“But I thought he was helping her a minute ago.”

“That was a different person.”

“It’s quite difficult to follow. All the people look the same.”

“They don’t all look the same. Just because they all have hats on.”

“Oh.”

We continue watching.

“Is Clint Eastwood in this one?”

We continue watching.

What with all the baby stuff, I have quite neglected writing about the cottage.

I met the Methodical Builder there the other day. I like the Methodical Builder – he is doing a terribly good job and soon I will have a habitable place to live.

He wanted me to choose the bricks. He showed me some bricks. I didn’t like the bricks. He then showed me some more bricks. I didn’t like those bricks either, and suspected they were the same bricks as previously demonstrated.

He pointed out that, like teenagers, bricks change their character immensely once they’re laid. I pointed out that in that case there wasn’t much point in him pointing out non-laid bricks to me, if they were going to be completely different once they were pointed. He took my point.

We agreed to go and look at some walls together. We went to see a wall. The bricks in the wall seemed hauntingly familiar. I asked the Methodical Builder if they were the same bricks that I had previously rejected (see para. 3 above) and he hummed and hawed a bit and said that they might be. I said that I didn’t like these bricks, so we went on to a builder’s merchants to see some more samples.

“These ones are pretty good,” he said, indicating a sample board on the wall. Once more, on examination, I found myself with a creeping sense of recognition, which was confirmed with a brief cross-referencing of the label. I made terribly English noises about not wanting to be a difficult customer and all that, but that I would much rather have some different bricks, which I subsequently chose.

Since then I have spoken to the Methodical Builder on the telephone, as he wanted to double-check my choice, in case he hadn’t heard correctly. I am now worried that I will not be there when the bricks are delivered and signed for, and am keen not to find that my choice of bricks has been overruled and in fact he has ordered the ones that he always wanted to have, but used various half-baked methods to disguise this, e.g. colouring each one slightly differently with felt-tip pen.